Pulled from Orbit
by ThatGuyRex
Summary: A TranceCentric fic. Purple Trance disappeared during 'Ouroboros'. What did she have to go through to mature into Gold Trance? What revelations? More importantly, how badly can one purple girl screw things up?
1. Pulled from Orbit

Author's Note: This is my first attempt at an Andromeda fanfic. I'm quite sure that the 'Whatever happened to Purple Trance' has been done before, but I still want to try my hand at it. It'll have Trance spoilers for the whole series. You've been warned. Read and review, let me know what you think.

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Trance stared at the woman in front of her, transfixed. Every fibre of the woman was screaming familiarity. The eyes told her everything she needed to know. "You're me. From the future."

The older woman smirked. "More or less." Her voice was rougher, older, but the same.

Trance tried to find cues in the older Trance's eyes. She tried to read something from the woman, anything, but the only feeling she got was one of foreboding. Of something awful. She hesitated, and then asked. "Did everything turn out the way it was supposed to?"

"No. Things are bad. And they're getting worse. I made a lot of mistakes." The older woman answered quickly.

Trance couldn't help glancing back at Beka. She knew where this was going to lead, and she didn't like the idea. She dragged her feet the best she could, drawing out the conversation with questions she already knew the answer to. "So are we going to lose?"

Older Trance seemed to recognize this, and sped the conversation along anyway. "At best, we're not going to win. You know what we have to do."

Trance sighed, searching her older self's face for something, anything that could help her, but the older woman's face was hard and unreadable. "Is it the only way?"

"There is one perfect possible future, but I have not seen it yet." As she spoke, something in the older woman's eyes flickered, the tiniest trace of compassion, but it made Trance feel better, all the same. She stepped away from her future self, moved to Beka's side. She met Beka's eyes, briefly.

"Beka, I have to go. But I'm not really leaving, I'm just changing. Everything will be ok. You'll see." Trance said. She tried to smile, for Beka, but her heart was already feeling heavy. If things really did work out, she would see them all again, but she had no idea how long it would take - or what she would have to go through to become the golden, steely woman who stood near the portal.

The portal that she now turned towards. She glanced at her older self, and then closed her eyes and walked straight through, into the unknown.

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It was dark. More than dark. The blackness was so thick that Trance couldn't even tell if her eyes were open. She tried to move, forward or backward, but there was nothing to push against. No floor, no walls. Just black.

"W-where is this place?" Trance stuttered, and the blackness muffled her voice so that it came out sounding small. A moment passed, and Trance turned her head, trying to squint through the inky void. Nothing helped, nothing penetrated the darkness.

"Trance Gemini." The voice rose around her, whispered from all directions at once. She could feel her heart speed up as she instinctively wrapped her arms around herself.

"Who are you?" She demanded, but the blackness again swallowed her words. "This isn't... the future." Her voice grew more hesitant. "Is this where I came from?"

"This is where you learn." The whispered voice came again.

Trance was beginning to feel frightened. Not only was she blind in the darkness, but she couldn't sense anything of the future, either. All she could feel was herself, hanging here. No threads into the future. No possibilities at all. "But in the future I must go back to the Andromeda, musn't I? And take the place of my past self? She said she had come from a horrible future. Where is that?" Trance sighed, dropping her arms in frustration.

"This is where you learn." The voice repeated.

"All right, this is where I learn." Trance replied, a petulant note entering her voice. "But what am I supposed to learn? I don't understand."

A light appeared in the distance, and slowly moved towards her. It glowed brightly, but in some strange way it didn't seem to diminish the blackness at all. It neared her, and she watched it intently. A tiny glimmer of recognition shivered down her spine, and she held out her arms. As the light slowed to a stop just above her cupped hands, she gazed down at it.

It was a tiny sun.


	2. Between Black and White

AN: Second chapter up. Review and let me know what you think, feedback is important to me. A reminder that this fic will most likely contain Trance spoilers. Thank you to my brother Cullen for Beta-ing this chapter.

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The golden sphere hangs above Trance's hands for a moment. Mesmerized by it, Trance notices the little tendrils of light that seem to reach out from the center of the ball. It pulses slowly, and Trance can feel herself drawn to it, almost magnetically. Slowly, gracefully, the ball dips lower. Setting down like a feather, it makes contact with her palms. 

A warm, serene feeling flows up her arms and down her spine. Instantly, everything around Trance is illuminated by a brilliant white light. The white blinds her just as effectively as the black had. Although she squints, she is unable to see anything past the pure radiance.

Gently, Trance cups her hands until they are wrapped around the ball of light. Beams shine out from between her fingers, and they provide a more tolerable light. Trance stares into the glow for a moment, feeling a pull that she has never felt before.

"Your first lesson." The voice whispers, and Trance can feel a presence from the ball of light. She is aware of a vast knowledge that is just out of her reach, for now. "Between the white and the black, you need to look for the shades of grey."

Finally able to see, Trance finds herself in a small room. The walls are a dingy beige. In the far left corner is a small bed, not much more than a mattress on a metal frame, with a thin brown blanket folded near the end. Across from the bed is a shabby bookshelf, dented and bare, save for cobwebs and dust. Beside the shelf is a hard wooden chair. The only ornamentation in the whole room is a flowery pattern engraved into the back of the chair. There are no doors or windows.

"Look for the grey." Trance repeats softly. She moves to the chair, the light still cupped inside her hands. She watches the ball. Every so often, small tendrils of light escape from between her fingers, only to retreat back inside a moment later.

Eventually, her curiousity breaks her away from the light and she turns her attention to the room. She tries to find traces of the room's previous occupants, a clue to why she is here, anything, but the room does not give up its secrets. No prints in the dust, no indentations in the bed. No writing on the wall. She pulls the blanket off of the mattress and wraps the ball of light inside, leaving it open at the top to light the room, and gently slides the wrapped bundle onto the shelf.

Returning to her seat on the chair, Trance watches the ball of light poke through the top of the blanket. After a moment, she reaches out for the ball and places the bundle onto her lap. Keeping her attention focused on the light, she asks, "Why am I here?"

A tiny finger of light reaches out as the whispered voice again answers. "You are here because there is much you need to learn."

Trance sighs, leaning back in the chair. "How do I learn?"

"You must listen."

Trance remains silent, listening obediently for a moment, but she hears nothing. She waits for the voice to continue, but no more words come. She shifts in her chair, and a note of impatience enters her voice. Clutching the bundle a little tighter, she gazes down into its depths. "Please, I know there is much to learn, but I want to learn what I must. I need to get back to the Andromeda. I'm worried about Dylan, and Beka, and Harper and -"

"LISTEN!" The whispered voice gains volume and grows to a thunder that reverberates through Trance's very being and freezes her words in mid-sentence. The bundle in her lap flares up, great splashes of light exploding into her face.

Images flood her mind as the world turns white around her, and then fades through grey into deep black.


	3. Potential, Untapped

AN: Thanks to the reviewers - I wasn't sure how cliche'd my chosen storyline was, and your positive responses are more than enough encouragement. Very, very appreciated. A reminder that I might take some liberties so shout at me if my characterizations are off, and that this fic will most likely contain Trance spoilers. And I forgot to add a disclaimer, so: I don't own anything. Unfortunately.

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Trance finds herself at the centre of a ball of flame, as images force their way into her mind. Each vivid perception seems to open a bigger hole in her being, and knowledge begins to pour in.

Inside herself, Trance tries to cringe away from the overload of information. It piles over her, unfathomable in its sheer volume. Images speed by too quickly to grasp. More and more knowledge assaults her presence, battering away her weak defenses. It whirls around her in an incomprehensible scramble, and Trance can only watch helplessly and try and ignore the millions of voices instructing in her mind. By the time her body tires and succumbs to exhaustion, she is no longer aware of it.

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Trance opens her eyes to discover herself lying on the mattress. The blanket-wrapped light sits on the chair, burning low. Trance pushes herself into a sitting position. She is thankful for the semi-darkness as a sharp pain throbs through her temples. The room wavers before her for a moment, and she takes a quick breath. "Focus." She murmurs to herself, and when she opens her eyes again the room has stopped moving. Carefully, she swings her legs over the edge of the bed. As soon as her feet touch the floor, the whispered voice once again rises about her.

"We shall see how much you have retained."

Too fast for Trance to completely register, a loud crash echoes around the small room and the light on the chair blinks out. Deep, smothering blackness falls immediately. Heart pounding, Trance leaps to her feet and extends her left arm. A small ball of light, completely identical to the one that had been before, forms above her palm. It floats gently down to the blanket where the original had sat.

As her breathing slows, Trance stares at the ball of light that she had created. She is aware of her arm, still stretched outwards, and she lowers it. "I didn't know I could do that." She says, a note of awe in her hesitant tone.

"You have not begun to harness the power that is available to you, Trance Gemini. What you thought you could do before is merely the beginning." The voice answers her. "Now, the knowledge is inside you. You need only to apply it."

"And you will teach me?" Trance lowers herself back into a seat on the bed. She folds her arms, glancing around the room. There is no answer, so Trance presses on. "Please, will you show yourself? I've been alone in this room since I got here. I don't feel right just talking to a voice."

"Very well." The whisper fades away and a form blinks into existance in front of the bookshelf. Trance stands, to get a better look. The figure is a fraction taller than Trance, but only because of the boots she is wearing. The rest of her apparel is covered by a thick brown cloak. The figure steps forward and Trance gasps as the light falls on her face.

"You're the future me! Well, you look like her... uh, me." Trance's brow wrinkles slightly, in confusion. "Are you?" She asks the figure, stepping closer.

A parental smile spreads across the figure's face. "No, sister. I am not you, past or future. We are merely of the same origin. I, too, am an avatar. I am here to help you reach the full extent of your power, so that you may take your place with your kin, in the fight against the Abyss."

Trance seems to think about this for a moment. "But when I left the Andromeda, my future self took my place. When I stepped through the portal, shouldn't I have stepped into the future? Where is the Andromeda now?"

"Past and future are relative terms, sister." The figure replies, her smile growing a little patronizing. "You shall see the Andromeda again. Dylan needs you to guide him to his place in the universe. But first, you must develop the skills you will need to get you there."

A grave expression settles on Trance's face as she watches her counterpart. "What should I call you?" She asks the figure, a trace of hesitation still creasing her features.

"You shall call me Mentor."


End file.
